Worlds Unknown

30+ and Counting!

This week has been a good week. Not a great week, although some great things have happened. And I’ve got a pretty good feeling that this coming week is going to be pretty great, too. It’s been a little off, due to a variety of things, none of them big things, but still steady. And any week that can be a little trick but still steady is a pretty decent week in my book. Lots to say about writing, so brace yourself. There’s a lot going on in my head and on the paper!

Reading: I finally got around to starting Misery, which I’m really excited about. It’s ’80s Stephen King, which has been the best Stephen King in my opinion, and it’s one of the few with movie adaptations where I haven’t seen the movie first. And this week I am most definitely going to finish Night Train To Memphis and Vampires in the Lemon Grove, or so help me God….!

Writing: Most of the excitement this week comes from writing, not because of anything new being accepted, but because of something accepted finally being printed. My short story, “The Alley,” has officially made it onto the The Saturday Evening Post. I now have an author bio on the Saturday Evening Post website. My story is in a sidebar with stories by Kurt Vonnegut, Ray Bradbury, and Shirley Jackson. I am dying. It’s so surreal but so fucking awesome, too.

And I need to remember that when I get my rejections. It’s been a heavy rejection week, with four of them if my count is right. That puts me at 31; one more rejection, and I’ll have as many rejections as I have years alive. It’s also weird because I’ve been getting some more submissions for the World Unknown Review from people with a laundry list of publishing credits that include all the journals I routinely get rejected from. That sets off an interesting, “I’m not worthy to judge these people!” reaction in my brain, but then I have to remember: these people know what they’re doing. There are hundreds and thousands of journals out there, but they chose mine. It’s not an easy journal to get into; I only pick nine stories. It’s not even a well paying journal (although it is, at least, a paying one). This is my baby, my wild idea, and it’s not like they have to send it to me. They wanted to, and I’m greatly honored by that. Just also really, really intimidated, too.

For my new writing project this week, I started up a potential entry for Disquieted Dreams’s “In Our Bodies” anthology. Started it, and the deadline is in five days, so I doubt I’ll finish it in time, but it’s at least worth the effort, right? I’ll be focusing on that until the 15th, then, and then I’ll probably focus on finishing a submission for The First Line.

Then there’s also the issue of NaNoWriMo coming up, which I’ve been doing consistently for so long I can’t even remember how long, even though I’ve never once won. But it’s the principle of it! Part of me would feel guilty starting another novel when I’ve got quite a few of them going right now, including one that I should be publishing next year because people are waiting for the end of the Slayer Saga trilogy, but…but…Hey, it’s just a month, what harm would that do? I’m thinking of approaching it differently this year, too (yeah, I always say that), so I’ll probably try to balance it all. It’s just a new focus I’ll try to work in probably during the evening, which might help spark some evening writing, which I currently have trouble doing. I also don’t have a topic yet, although earlier this year, I was thinking of doing a Mad Max-esque book inspired directly by M.I.A.’s Kala album, but now I’m not too sure.

Other Stuff: Not too much other stuff going on. Sometimes I feel a little bad about that, but, for the most part, I’m perfectly content to live a life that is mostly just surrounded by writing. What other kind of life would I even want to have??

How’s everyone else been doing? Any other NaNo participants out there, and what are you plotting? Me? Right now, the only thing I’m plotting is to go have some breakfast.

Oh, I hope so! I’ve got a weird relationship with Stephen King’s writing, but the story has definitely always intrigued me, so I’m excited. And I’m sorry about NaNo? Too much going on? Maybe I’ll definitely have to do it for the both of us, then! (But I never win, so don’t get too excited).